Days 165-171- Off to the beach to drink beer

Days 165-169 were spent in pure anticipation of returning to the adlibing tour, which we undertook on days 170-171! On Friday night after rushing through our afternoon classes, we grabbed our day bags (oh what a blessing to be free of our packs) and made haste for the fast train to Qingdao.

With the train reaching speeds of 231km/h it wasn't long before we reached our destination: Qingdao. Once occupied by Germany, Qingdao is famous throughout China for it's beaches and the first brewery in China - the beer that comes out of the Tsingtao Brewery is sent all around China and even around the world.

After staying in a dodgy hostel on Friday night (dodgy is more of a sugar coated description for the standard of this place! - especially due to its communal shower and toilets and bedding that clearly hadn't been washed since a few guests ago), we set off on foot to walk along Qingdao's coast. Destination no.1: 2008 Olympics Sailing Village, well, we tried to see it but the guards were unaccommodating, so we had to settle for a view from the perimetre instead.

Next we used our noses to follow the salty air towards the coast, and we soon found ourselves at the May 4th Square, perched above the first of a series of beaches we would walk along. We managed to keep track of where we were because the beaches are conveniently named swimming beach 1 - swimming beach 6 (though you wouldn't catch us swimming in any of these beaches - especially in Winter)!

While Liv ate chocolate sitting on a bench overlooking the beach, Adam released his inner child (this doesn't usually take much effort) and went exploring. Down on the beach he collected pretty shells for Liv and watched the locals gathering seaweed that had been washed up during the high tide and would soon be gracing diners plates in nearby restaurants.

After a couple of hours of wandering we ventured inland, hopped on a bus and headed nowhere in particular. As luck would have it the bus drove right past the Hostelling International and stopped 100 metres down the road - and considering we had nowhere to sleep for the night, we decided to disembark and check it out. Inside we were greeted in the usual hostel manner by overly friendly, semi-English speaking staff, who were only more than happy to show us around.

With a new room and two bags less, we headed off to explore the old town and some of the German architecture that is on offer! On our way to find food, we wandered down a market street that was overflowing with an abundance of fresh fruit and veges, flopping fish fresh from the sea, butchered meat (including smiling sheep heads), and snacks galore! At lunch Adam was so specific with what he wanted to eat that the cook's wife sent him up the road to the market to buy supplies even though Adam's desired dish was not on the menu! What service! After filling up on food and Tsingtao beer (when in Rome ...), we headed down some back alleys to get a view of the city that used to be, wandering past workers 7 stories up on their bamboo scaffolding unharnessed, dilapidated buildings, the port, and eventually onto the main shopping street.

After a couple of hours of walking around we finally made it to the old St Michael's Catholic Church, which has been serving Qingdao's Catholics since 1934 (though it has been heavily renovated after its semi-destruction during the cultural revolution).

Another adlibing adventure eventually deposited us at Bathing Beach No. 6 where we hung out with hundreds of other tourists taking in the stunning ocean views as we all headed along the pier to the Hulian Pavilion. From here we could see "Little Qingdao", the Peninsula that houses a German-built lighthouse. Along the pier coral, seashells, and starfish were for sale everywhere, after being torn away from their natural habitat over the day.

After layering up with more clothes at the hostel we headed to Beer Street for the night! Here we got to see the famous 1903 Tsingtao Brewery. Beer Street was full of giant beer cans, beer bottle structures, manhole covers decorated with various beer drinking animals and of course a multitude of restaurants. There were no details left untouched, with rubbish bins in the shape of beer barrels and bottle-shaped street benches.

In the mood to quench our thirst we battled our way through the keg fortresses that line the streets outside each restaurant, and with little fuss soon had a massive jug of Tsingtao beer and an order of food on the way! A rare situation appeared when Adam had to fight with Liv over the beer - if he'd known his girlfriend was drinking he'd have ordered two jugs!

To walk the beer off we browsed through the night markets scattered around town, to the point where we needed to snack on more food, before heading home to escape the cold - the chilly sea breeze hit us close to home, reminding us a little too much of the Wellington wind!!

In the morning we spent our last few hours in Qingdao wandering through the old town where the dirt of a long existence had built up to the point that it painted the alleyways and streets with its own personal colour and fragrance. We wandered around admiring the slowly dying German architecture, we had to wonder to ourselves if we returned in 5 years how much of this natural and historical beauty would be gone. We also visited Guanhaishan Park where China's first Observatory is located, where we enjoyed a rooftop drink and took in the magnificent views over the city, with our new husky friend!

We had to accomplish one major task before we left Qingdao, outside the many restaurants and street kitchens are stacks of Tsingtao beer kegs where you can purchase beer fresh from the brewery by the bag full. Yes, you read right, they fill plastic bags full of yellow gold and weigh it - you get 500mls of beer for 1.50RMB or 25NZ cents!

After lunch it was time to head to the train station for our return trip home - it's nice to have a place to go 'home' to! The great thing about returning to your hometown is you know which bus to catch where - and since it was dinner time when we got back, we headed straight to our local haunt 'the food street'!

Although we had a brilliant weekend, the reality of teaching an 8 hour day the next day, soon put somewhat of a dampener on our good moods!

Adlibing Qingdao's beer.